Dead in the Water

the St. Marks Navy, if there is one, probably doesn’t have,” Kramer chipped in. “Do you know if she had any family?”
    “She didn’t say, but I got the impression she was unmarried. Her passport was still in the name of Manning, and they had probably been divorced for a good ten years.”
    “How long had Manning been married to Allison when he died?”
    “Four years.”
    “Did the two women know each other?”
    “They never met.”
    “You think the other Mrs. Manning just came down here in the hope of money, then?”
    “Seems that way, but please don’t quote me as having said so.”
    “Is somebody notifying next of kin?”
    “I suppose the local police will handle that.”
    “Stone,” Forrester said, “do you think she might have been some sort of help to you at Allison’s trial?”
    Stone shook his head. “I can’t imagine how. I don’t think she had seen Paul since the divorce.”
    “Did Sir Winston Sutherland know she was here?” Kramer asked.
    Stone shrugged. “I don’t think so. He was here for dinner last night; she was sitting with me, and they didn’t speak.”
    “I take it you didn’t introduce them,” Kramer said dryly.
    “I’m not the social director around here,” Stone said with a straight face.
    Kramer laughed. “Can’t say I blame you.”
    “I suppose it will make an interesting footnote to my piece,” Forrester said.
    “I haven’t seen you taking any notes,” Kramer observed.
    “I have a very good memory,” Forrester said. Then he frowned, placed a hand on his belly, and stood up quickly. “Uh-oh,” he said, then ran for the stairs.
    “I guess he wasn’t feeling as well as he thought,” Kramer said.
    “I guess not,” Stone agreed.
    “Stone, you’ve answered all of my questions, but why do I have the feeling there’s something you haven’t told me?”
    “About what?”
    “About this Elizabeth Manning?”
    “I never saw the woman before yesterday; never heard of her, either.”
    “Did she demand money from Allison?” Not until after her lawyer had made her an offer, Stone reflected. “No,” he replied.
    “Was she headed for Connecticut to pursue something with the estate?”
    “Not to my knowledge,” he said.
    “If she had, would she have had a claim?”
    “There’s no mention of her in Paul Manning’s will.”
    Kramer closed her notebook. “Well, I’ll phone this in after breakfast.”
    They ate their food in silence, then Thomas waved some papers at Stone, and he went to the bar.
    “Fax for you,” Thomas said.
    Stone took a stool and read through Libby Manning’s divorce decree, then he laughed out loud.
    “What?” Thomas asked.
    “Nothing,” Stone replied. “By the way, did Libby Manning make any phone calls last night?”
    “Nope; no calls on her bill. Anyway, you told me to unplug her phone.”
    “Right.” Stone was looking at Libby’s divorce decree, at the instructions for alimony. “Plaintiff shall pay to the defendant the sum of three thousand dollars a month on the first day of every month,” he read, “beginning immediately and continuing for a period of ten years.” He checked the date on the decree. Libby Manning’s alimony had run out three weeks earlier. She must have been desperate, he thought, but she had been cool enough to shake down Allison for four hundred thousand dollars, with his help.
    He walked away shaking his head.

Chapter
31
    A s Stone walked back toward the marina he could not stop thinking about Libby Manning. He was depressed, and he felt guilty, though he could not think why. Certainly a human being was dead, one he had known; but not one he had known well or had come to care about. So why couldn’t he shake the feeling? He boarded Expansive and went below. Allison was putting something away in a cupboard.
    “Libby Manning is dead,” he said.
    “Come again? I don’t think I heard you right.”
    “Libby is dead. Chester crashed shortly after takeoff this morning, and Libby and a local woman were killed, along with Chester.”
    She stood, staring at him for a long moment. “Dead,” she repeated tonelessly. “No chance she might still be alive?”
    “The airplane went down in at least six hundred feet of water. Chester’s body was recovered, but nobody else.”
    Allison sank onto a sofa, looking as if the wind had been knocked out of her. “How could this have happened?” she asked.
    “There was an engine fire, but nobody knows why, and my guess is that nobody is going